Flappy Paddles

Obviously being a Lincoln it is configured for Grandma. It has senility detection systems just like Cadillac. That's why the ATS is so slow, because they were worried that Grandma might crash it.
___________________________

SuperDuper:Am I the only person to drive a manual who recognizes the driver connection that is increased from the feeling of clutch engagement, the feeling of sliding it into a gear and the slight vibrations in the stick from the motor working? If nobody else appreciates that feedback from the car then why would they ever want anything but flappy paddles with their hands on the wheel.

Fun manually selecting gears on an automatic at legal speeds? Hey bud - you see how I dropped to second going into that corner! It was awesome. To bad we're already at WalMart. The drive was really getting exciting.

Scott Evans:We're clearly talking about two different kinds of feedback. With your definition, the click of the paddle is a type of "feedback." Neither my example or yours is really telling you anything about what the car is doing or how effective your manipulation of the controls is, the type of feedback I was talking about. Now we're just discussing which base sensory input we like better, something that has no objective standard.

My definition is the only relevant reason to select a manual transmission over any type of manumatic transmission. Because otherwise you can drive an auto and not screw around with heel toe and most often not have your hands off the wheel. It is purely psychological. Obviously whether the feedback on the manual being good or not is subjective but we can objectively say you get tactile feedback or you do not.

In fact - back to your saying a click is a type of feedback - we will have plenty of people arguing how much better magnesium paddles are than plastic and probably how much better the click action feels.
___________________2010 Taurus SELFastbacks are for Louvers!

SuperDuper:Am I the only person to drive a manual who recognizes the driver connection that is increased from the feeling of clutch engagement, the feeling of sliding it into a gear and the slight vibrations in the stick from the motor working? If nobody else appreciates that feedback from the car then why would they ever want anything but flappy paddles with their hands on the wheel.

Fun manually selecting gears on an automatic at legal speeds? Hey bud - you see how I dropped to second going into that corner! It was awesome. To bad we're already at WalMart. The drive was really getting exciting.

Scott Evans:We're clearly talking about two different kinds of feedback. With your definition, the click of the paddle is a type of "feedback." Neither my example or yours is really telling you anything about what the car is doing or how effective your manipulation of the controls is, the type of feedback I was talking about. Now we're just discussing which base sensory input we like better, something that has no objective standard.

SuperDuper:My definition is the only relevant reason to select a manual transmission over any type of manumatic transmission. Because otherwise you can drive an auto and not screw around with heel toe and most often not have your hands off the wheel. It is purely psychological. Obviously whether the feedback on the manual being good or not is subjective but we can objectively say you get tactile feedback or you do not.

In fact - back to your saying a click is a type of feedback - we will have plenty of people arguing how much better magnesium paddles are than plastic and probably how much better the click action feels.

Because they do feel better. I have driven manuals quite a bit and I won't argue the command/control and fun factor is there. But having a good transmission with good set of paddles is better than nothing. Also they do work much better with more gears for some reason.

MT said the shifter toggle isn't as good as flappy paddles because they have to take their hand off the wheel to shift. Ergo flappy paddles are better than a manual transmission because you don't have to take your hands off the wheel. Problem?
___________________2010 Taurus SELFastbacks are for Louvers!

They're the Nissan GT-R of transmissions.If you care more about raw numbers than the experience, by all means.
"There's a lie that all drivers tell themselves -- death is something that happens to other people. That's how you find the courage to get in the car in the first place. But more powerful than even the fear of death itself is the will to win."

IMHO a sports car should have 3 pedals and a shifter that you manually put into gear. Without those things, I have no interest. Are paddles faster? Sure but I prefer the involvement an the satisfaction of shifting for myself. I'll likely never race a car that I own and if it does see track time it would be solely for my enjoyment not for absolute times.

Autos are great for daily drivers and luxury cars.
---------------------------------------------------On the internet you can be anything you want. Its strange that so many people choose to be stupid.

personally I think flappy paddles are a complete waste of time. I mean granted I haven't driven Ferraris and the like with them but every car I have driven with them I found myself saying, who the hell cares?
____________________Norman Byron Greenburg- westys

SuperDuper:MT said the shifter toggle isn't as good as flappy paddles because they have to take their hand off the wheel to shift. Ergo flappy paddles are better than a manual transmission because you don't have to take your hands off the wheel. Problem?

Yes, they are "better", from a performance perspective. That's why F1 uses them.

Everyone in this thread is arguing about different things.

Scott is talking about the feedback from a performance advantage perspective, where you want the gear to change as quickly and responsively as possible. You are talking about the feedback of the specific parts of a manual transmission working together.
_________________________________________________________________________Life begins......at 180 MPH.

I have driven all sorts of DSG cars, autos with paddles and manuals. Its hard to generalize.

however:

(1) A paddle shifter on a conventional auto is a waste of time as far as I am concerned

(2) A paddle shifter on a DSG box such as Porsche's PDK gives you just as much control as a manual and you can shift faster. Its just madness to think you have less control.

(3) If you know how to heel-and-toe properly you can do a good job of manual shifting quickly. I have had a string if M cars and 911 manuals and have enjoyed them. Not as track competitive as a PDK though. However, I think of it as a nice, soon-to-be obsolete skill and will hang onto my RS manuals.

(4) The future is paddle shift, and if you are looking for a top-level performance car, you can basically write off Porsche, Ferrari, Pagani, Bugatti, Mercedes, and eventually all the rest. There will still be cars in the middle and economy range which are manual, and some domestics as the US will be the final resting place for manual. In Germany, for instance, the manual is basically dead already.

You need to personally take a few of them out on the track and compare. If you prefer manual, fair enough, but it makes no sense to knock a DSG paddle shift if you have never tried one in anger.
_________________________2010 GT3RS, 2008 GT3RS 2008 Cayenne S , 2006 BMW M6 2005 ,Smart ForTwo ,2003 Mercedes SL500

I have driven all sorts of DSG cars, autos with paddles and manuals. Its hard to generalize.

however:

(1) A paddle shifter on a conventional auto is a waste of time as far as I am concerned

(2) A paddle shifter on a DSG box such as Porsche's PDK gives you just as much control as a manual and you can shift faster. Its just madness to think you have less control.

(3) If you know how to heel-and-toe properly you can do a good job of manual shifting quickly. I have had a string if M cars and 911 manuals and have enjoyed them. Not as track competitive as a PDK though. However, I think of it as a nice, soon-to-be obsolete skill and will hang onto my RS manuals.

(4) The future is paddle shift, and if you are looking for a top-level performance car, you can basically write off Porsche, Ferrari, Pagani, Bugatti, Mercedes, and eventually all the rest. There will still be cars in the middle and economy range which are manual, and some domestics as the US will be the final resting place for manual. In Germany, for instance, the manual is basically dead already.

You need to personally take a few of them out on the track and compare. If you prefer manual, fair enough, but it makes no sense to knock a DSG paddle shift if you have never tried one in anger.

You forget, a ton of what is spewed in this forum is just from armchair racers.

SuperDuper:MT said the shifter toggle isn't as good as flappy paddles because they have to take their hand off the wheel to shift. Ergo flappy paddles are better than a manual transmission because you don't have to take your hands off the wheel. Problem?

Jaws:Yes, they are "better", from a performance perspective. That's why F1 uses them.

Everyone in this thread is arguing about different things.

Scott is talking about the feedback from a performance advantage perspective, where you want the gear to change as quickly and responsively as possible. You are talking about the feedback of the specific parts of a manual transmission working together.

F1 uses them for more than one reason. One of which is ergonomics. This is why they have a paddle actuated clutch. It allows them more room for a larger brake pedal. In addition in an F1 car they can actually control the clutch from one of those paddles - unlike any production car I'm aware of. They do this to launch the car as the F1 engines need to have the piss revved out of them to make any power and get moving. The gear box in an F1 also has no torque converter so without a driver controlled clutch if they weren't moving they can stall out. Additionally they were developed in the first place to remove the mechanical linkage and give them more flexibility in designing the car. Not taking their hands off the wheel is just a bonus of the design.

So really the performance perspective is they want to shift fast and to be able to design the rest of the car more flexibly. I don't think the constraints of F1 should be use to justify paddle shifters on my Taurus with its slushbox auto. It doesn't perform in any way as the F1 does anyway.

There is no feedback in terms of a performance advantage for any transmission type. There is only response time and keeping your hands on the wheel. The feed back I'm referring to is the only real reason to get a tried and true manual transmission. Because on the connection with the machine you are controlling.
___________________2010 Taurus SELFastbacks are for Louvers!